


White Tide

by HardlyFair



Series: A Year in 6000 [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 1700s, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Aziraphale's Halo, Banter, Crowley to the Rescue (Good Omens), Explicit Sexual Content, First Kiss, Frottage, Golden Age of Piracy, Historical References, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Intricate Rituals, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Pirates, Praise Kink, Protective Crowley (Good Omens), Snake Crowley (Good Omens), Soft Aziraphale (Good Omens), pirate Crowley and navy Aziraphale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-07-21
Packaged: 2020-07-09 02:37:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19880215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HardlyFair/pseuds/HardlyFair
Summary: — West Indies. August, 1718 —“Lieutenant Robert Maynard is meant to find Blackbeard sometime soon. I was supposed to be part of a scouting trip. Bless them with good wind and a favourable tide.”“Right, what’d you scout?”Aziraphale sighed, presenting his bound wrists. “Pirates.”





	White Tide

> _\-- West Indies, August, 1718 --_

They’d discovered Aziraphale below deck with three books.

A first-edition red hardcover bound in leather, the draft of something by Johnathan Swift, and a journal of the surgeon on board. Respectively, they were titled, _Paradife Loft: Book I, Gulliver’s ~~Travelles~~ Travells_, and _Alfred Sweeney’s Tales for Mummy_.

Aziraphale had thought they might be worth keeping. 

John Milton would murder him if he knew his handwriting was about to go down in seawater.

“Please,” Aziraphale said when the first ruffian snagged him by the elbow at the point of a dagger, “the books!”

The delicate part about the ship Aziraphale was accompanying down the coast of the colonies was that it belonged to the Royal Navy of England. It had nice men in uniform, which Aziraphale enjoyed, a sense of regulation and law, but a less-than-fanatastic meal selection.

In the early evenings, the crew were generally at their positions by the rigging, the captain at the helm, the ship was making upright leeway, and Aziraphale was in his study as the disinterested navigator. 

Precisely twenty-two minutes ago, this ship had sailed into pirate-infested waters.

At the current moment, the crew were attached to weights and on their way to the bottom of the ocean, the captain was lying some-bits-here-and-some-bits-there, the ship was sinking, and Aziraphale was trying to keep hold of his books.

Presently, someone forced Aziraphale’s hands behind his back, yanking the crook of his arm and pulling at his ruffled ties. The angel lost his iron grip, and the volumes tumbled to the half foot of saltwater covering the floor, pages askew and covers bent and ruined in an instant.

A blast in the flooring by their feet was slowly churning foamy water, filling the hull and dredging the Navy ship down. 

"Do you _need_ to do that!" Aziraphale shouted. The pirate shoved his arm up further, twisting the bright red linen of Aziraphale’s coat. Aziraphale yelped reflexively. "Good heavens!"

" _Good heavens!_ " Exclaimed the pirate, laughing. " _Good heavens_ , he says!"

Aziraphale watched his stories sink with a dewey gaze as the pirates wrenched him above deck, where the slant of the sinking Navy ship was obvious. The long shadows cast by the setting sun lent a sublime baroque effect to the capture, where the invaders appeared in black from the same.

Oh, he'd forgotten how inconvenient human pain was! How all-encompassing it could be, how difficult it was to remain above it all and feign ignorance. No other angel was as familiar with it as Aziraphale, but even Aziraphale rarely experienced it.

He had a particular, absent companion to thank for that.

Where _was_ Crowley? He’d thought he’d been getting closer. Aziraphale had been feeling his distant presence for the last month!

Right now, his mind couldn’t feel anything past the sour twinge in his upper arms.

It was a slow drag, from one ship to the other - it had to be, when the Navy fleet was quickly submerging herself, and the massive holes cannoned into her broadside hull were not helping matters. State-issued rifles and impeccable red uniforms mottled to a main deck of disarray, mismatched cutlasses, and far too much loose black cloth and body odor. 

Aziraphale nervously tilted his chin up as a large man in a larger hat pressed the sharp edge of an aforementioned cutlass to Aziraphale's throat. He swallowed, and the movement brought the blade ever closer. 

"What do we think?" Asked the quartermaster to the present hands. He wore one of the red coats, pilfered from the crew of Aziraphale's ship. It had a suspicious dark stain over the lapel. Aziraphale had half a mind to make a quip about it being ill-fitting. "A dance with Jack Ketch, or a long walk off a short plank?"

"Oh, I'm sure - sure you're the most honorable of privateers," Aziraphale began, an anxious smile permeating his words. "But I don't think it's conductive to--"

The man at his back twisted his arm, and the quartermaster decided that Aziraphale would be set off the plank at sunrise - a last hurrah to Her Royal Navy, sending off the final survivor. 

Drowning was an awful way to go, he'd heard, burning in the lungs and all that. Aziraphale wasn't looking forward to it.

Not to mention the marine life - the oceans still had sharks, didn’t it? _And_ he’d miss his blessing deadlines!

After dragging him into the bilge, where the fading sunlight hardly reached, Aziraphale was backed into a wooden pillar and shoved to the floor. 

It was all a tad too rough for his taste.

A pirate lashed his hands behind his lower back, fixing him to the nearest post with hard knots. The corner of it dug into his spine. And there was that distracting human pain again, throbbing in his wrists.

He pulled a little, but there was no extra give. She pushed him back, tying his ankles together. Aziraphale fidgeted, the wood too hard on his backside.

“Excuse me, excuse me - I don’t see the point of— oh, that’s quite tight—”

The shoulders of his issued body weren’t built to bend like this.

As the ruffian stepped back to admire her handiwork, Aziraphale sputtered after her, “You really should let me go. I can stand here just as fine. The floor’s disgusting and I’m going to get into trouble for a damaged body.”

He’d already had enough trouble when Gabriel had approached him last week in New England with a spiel concerning one-too-many flippant miracles. Angels at head office were starting to notice that he was also definitely lacking a flaming sword. It was better to lay low, let them forget about him and his missing sword for awhile, not have his name pop up in Heaven with every ‘miracle performed!’ notification. 

Of course, now he’d gone and gotten himself kidnapped. Getting inconveniently discorporated and sent back to Heaven would definitely get him on the short list for an investigation, but miracling himself out and away from this situation would do it much quicker.

In short, he had until dawn to remove himself from this bloody ship, without using divine influence to aid his way. 

Lord. How was going to go about doing that? He was hardly a soldier, anymore. Couple of thousands of years of softness could do that to you.

The pirate woman left, probably to go and comb her wispy beard that Aziraphale’s fussing has disturbed.

At the top of the soggy stairs, the door shut behind her, closing out the fading evening light and muffling the chorus of a shanty above deck. 

Well. This was just peachy. 

Aziraphale tipped his head to his shoulder, attempting to smooth down the side of hair that had been mussed to no avail. It took a bit of willpower to keep from fixing it miraculously. 

It was so stuffy in here. He drew in a slow breath, feeling the southern heat at the back of his nose. The layers of his outfit were becoming uncomfortably warm. Stuffy and _damp_. How could anyone stand to be inside the bellows of a sailing ship for more than half an hour?

That half hour came and went. And then so did three more. The line of sunset orange disappeared from beneath the door. Rocking slowly, the ship ventured into the night.

Of all things, Aziraphale found himself longing for his quarters in the Navy ship, which had been just as stuffy but a lot less damp. Longing for his red uniform to be unruffled and smooth, longing for the sun that didn't beat down on his figure like it did here in the southern tropics, longing to be anywhere but here. Perhaps somewhere with Crowley, who had not ever tried to stuff him into a damp cargo hold, but had occasionally made empty threats to. 

He ought to have longed to be in Heaven, but head office was far from his imagination. 

Aziraphale took in the dark room of his capture, squinting to make out vague shapes. Besides the scuffling of bilge rats somewhere in the shadows and the creaking towers of whatever cargo pirates brought along with them, he was alone. Going by the fevered scratching of the rats, it had to be rations. Well. At least they would be placated enough to leave Aziraphale be.

Good lord, that was a mind-numbing consideration, wasn’t it? 

“Hello?” He called out to be sure. The crates creaked back at him.

He resisted a scowl.

There was no light left to miracle. Aziraphale closed his eyes and extended his reach, trying to feel if there was a lantern nearby, one that could flicker on without attracting any Heavenly attention. In the crew's quarters, he felt the men asleep in rocking hammocks, with lanterns aplenty. Faint warmth emanated from the lamps in the Captain's office. There were a few torches on the quarter deck, affixed to railings. Would there be harm in snapping one to this side of the ship? 

Without his miracles, he couldn't even _let there be light_. 

No use. Oh, he was going to miss those precious books... He should've risked the reprimand from Gabriel to save them. Were they ever to meet again in some afterlife, Milton would ring his neck.

Aziraphale had a few disgruntled authors after him by this point. 

"Blast," he muttered. There must’ve been a more physical solution, though he loathed to try any.

He planted his feet, pushing back into the post and twisted his shoulder the wrong way in an attempt to free his hands from his binds. His footing slipped over the slick, rotten wood. No luck, and his elbows strained for his trouble. Why did humans have to be so skilled at tying each other up? Aziraphale felt he was always on the wrong side of the rope. 

He jolted his hands again, grimacing at the sharp human pain that seared below his wet wrists. Was he bleeding? Bother.

Behind him, something hard toppled to the floor.

Aziraphale ceased his struggle, listening intently with wide eyes. The vessel groaned, and his breath slowed. No other sound came to him from the dark underbelly of the ship. 

Warily, he called out, "Hello? Is someone there?"

When there wasn't an immediate answer, Aziraphale frowned. "If there's anyone here, I'll have you know that it's extremely rude to kidnap someone, give them the date of their execution, and then _not_ accommodate them fairly."

He cursed internally at the resounding silence. A hard turn must've dislodged old cargo crates - although Aziraphale hadn't felt the lean of the ship.

He’d had better treatment in Greece! _Greece_. And he’d hardly been a prisoner for more than a night there, before Crowley had somehow got wind of him being in the area. 

As a final attempt, Aziraphale kicked out his feet, lashed together at the ankles. This accomplished absolutely nothing, and now his heels smarted irrationally. If only he could spot something sharp or metal close by, perhaps within reach, he could pass it to his hands and cut himself loose. If he'd had any practical naval training, he'd have been able to escape with only a pin or a needle.

Unfortunately, he'd skipped that seminar to enjoy lunch with a few governors in Virginia.

It was hopeless. Heaven was going to discover he’d given away his sword. _Lost_ was one thing, _given away_ was another field entirely! 

With a burdened sigh, Aziraphale willed a familiar glimmer of Light to appear above his head.

Desperate measures.

The halo warmed his whole being, throwing shadows down the golden lines of his service buttons, and brightening the cramped bilge. As he concentrated, it intensified, scanning the floorboards for anything of use. He needed to steal away, and Heaven was mad if they thought summoning his own halo was worse than getting discorporated by pirates! 

The golden glow pulsed, uncovering the further walls, the secret corners, the unseen things. There were more thick ropes strung up along the back walls, sodden piles of wood scraps, and a few curious insects that scattered when faced with heavenly Light.

The floor shone back at him, wet and greasy. A pang of irritation shot Aziraphale for the sake of the seat of his trousers. 

The box that had fallen was half-broken on the floor somewhere to Aziraphale’s left. The cords that had lashed it to the rest of the crates had apparently snapped. Hm.

Aziraphale kept searching, pulling as far one way as his bounds and strained shoulders allowed him. There wasn’t a feasible way for him to see behind the rubbish and cargo and boxed supplies. Even if he could spot something of use, it would be too far from him to work.

Ultimately, no sharp gleam revealed itself.

Oh, well. ‘Drowning’ it would have to be. 

Aziraphale slumped, tipping his head back against the wooden pole, and tried to busy himself counting the grains of oak wood in the hull ceiling. 

Another crate toppled over. 

Aziraphale jerked in surprise, swiveling to find a second broken crate had joined the first.

He grew properly cross. The halo burned brightly, like a dim gaslamp someone had added gunpowder to. Had the crew not been thoroughly asleep, someone might’ve noticed the blinding Light seeping out from the bilge walls.

Aziraphale froze.

Unease began to crawl through his system, nerves pricking alert. It was the sort of cautious feeling you got when someone was looking at the back of your head. 

Beside the rats, something else was down here with Aziraphale.

Something smooth slithered lazily by his hands, the round bumps of warm scales flirting just beneath a bound fingertip.

Good lord.

It gave him the semblance of a caress, and went on for several seconds, betraying the line of a very, very long body. It slid on away, and left him feeling alone. He scarcely breathed, too apprehensive to move.

It didn’t make a sound. Aziraphale strained to hear, but all that greeted him was the shushing of the waves outside. 

Even using his Light, he could not turn his face enough to see behind himself and the post he was fixed to. For all intents, he remained in the figurative dark. 

The body returned, surprising Aziraphale, and this time lingered. It moved between Aziraphale’s wrists, sliding out from under his palms, around his fingers like the rope itself, as if this hidden serpent was investigating what Aziraphale was doing down in its hunting ground, and what he was doing all tied up. 

A tasting tongue flickered against Aziraphale’s thumb.

At the knot of his binds came the smallest tug. 

Aziraphale widened his eyes. 

It _had_ to be a message from the Almighty! _Buck up, Aziraphale!_ She was saying, _I’ll get you free even if those sorry angels in Heaven can’t manage it!_

“Oh!" He exclaimed, shivering, "Oh, what a _good_ snake, what a _clever—”_

The smooth expanse of scales slipped from between his hands, disappearing entirely. 

“You’ll want to quit that, angel,” said a voice.

Definitely not the Almighty.

Heat burned into Aziraphale’s collar. He twisted, peering half over his shoulder.

Crowley stood over him, a smarmy baring of his teeth constituting a wide smile, partly hidden in the shadow of the wooden pilings filling the bilge alongside Aziraphale.

Sparing a once-over to the demon, Aziraphale noted his outfit with a disapproving glance, from the ragged, scratchy red stubble gracing his face, to the shoulder-length curly hair, to the tight black trousers. The clasps of his long boots gleamed in the ring of light.

There may have been the slightest flush of pink over his cheekbones.

Crowley stared pointedly above Aziraphale’s head, yellow eyes awash in the glow from Aziraphale’s halo.

The immense relief at hearing Crowley’s voice vanished.

The halo winked itself out, plunging them into darkness.

Aziraphale’s vision went blurry and unfocused. Crowley’s voice coasted to his ear, same as the snake, slick in the black, slightly off-beat. “Come now, we can’t both be blind.”

Resolutely, Aziraphale willed his halo not to reappear. It and his wings remained of another realm for the moment. “You weren’t meant to see that,” he snapped.

“What, you mean you don’t go around showing it off? Nearly six millennia and I hadn’t seen the damned thing, I was beginning to wonder if it existed at all.”

Aziraphale turned his face away from where Crowley’s voice was emanating.

Crowley was having a wonderful time, going by his inflection. “Oh, don’t be petty.” He crouched beside Aziraphale, close enough for the heat of his body to pour off him. A warm wave of fondness encircled Aziraphale. “You’re an angel, through and through. Of course you’d have a beautiful halo. But I thought you’d recognize me.”

Was it his imagination in the dark - or did Crowley sound sore?

“Well! It’s not everyday I see you as a snake.”

“It’s not everyday you see a snake on a pirate ship in the first place,” Crowley’s tone held a smile, trying to catch Aziraphale’s eye and failing. Aziraphale listened to the rasp of clothing as Crowley rubbed his arm and the click of something metal unfolding. “Bit hard to get warm on these things. How come you haven’t already magicked yourself out of here?”

Heavens, Aziraphale was taken aback with the turn in this situation. His cheeks flamed hotter than they had with literal holy Light burning inches above him.

Aziraphale’s fingers twitched, touching the edges of the rope around his wrists. They remained sturdily fixed at his lower back. 

He slumped and finally glanced over at his rescuer, embarrassment fading. Crowley was a silver outline, slowly appearing from shadow.

“Heaven’s started to get on me about frivolous miracles.” 

“Frivolous?” Said Crowley. Aziraphale tracked the subtle movement of his mouth as he spoke, swore he saw his nostrils flare. “It can’t be considered frivolous if you’re hours from death by execution.”

“Discorporation. I’m bound to be reprimanded soon.”

“It’s not like there’s a limited number of miracles.” Crowley paused. “Is there?”

“Like I should tell you.”

Aziraphale’s vision adjusted enough to catch Crowley’s sneer. Crowley mocked him, as if to say, ‘ _I needn’t know, anywhile!_ ’

“Past that,” he said, “they don’t seem to take issue with you bringing about your halo willy-nilly.”

Aziraphale scoffed. “Willy-nilly! Need I remind you, I’m stuck on a pirate ship to be executed, and you were a snake until a minute ago!”

“Still a snake, technically. Any human could have spotted your private moment.”

“They’re all exhausted from rushing about excitedly for my execution in the morning, there’s no one to care,” said Aziraphale.

The snap of Crowley’s fingers sounded close to Aziraphale’s neck. Shadows fell starkly beneath Aziraphale, light gleaming off the top rows of buttons down his coat. A gas lamp appeared with a squeal, built in faulty steel to the post Aziraphale was bound to, illuminating them from above.

Crowley’s face crinkled with mirth, inches from his. 

Crowley had settled new glasses over his sharp nose during their time in the dark. This pair was more delicate than any Aziraphale had seen Crowley wear, with a curling metal snake framing the round rims. It had firey topaz eyes, same to match the amber they concealed. While staring at him, Aziraphale swore both pairs of snake eyes blinked.

Heaven felt a little further away when Crowley was this near, and Aziraphale didn’t mind. Memories of clinical white eased away, pursued by that golden stare, chased by guilt and an abandoned sense of duty. 

Crowley smiled crookedly. 

Aziraphale relaxed. Crowley was here, with his strange taste in fashion the same as ever, and so Aziraphale would be out of this mouldy place soon enough.

Just had to go through a habitual patch of teasing to get there.

His companion’s charming smile turned sly. “Why are you dressed like _that?”_

Aziraphale glanced down at himself. It was a fine outfit. Regulation! Exasperated, he looked up at Crowley, considering the many heavenly secrets he’d divulged in the past. This, and his verbal warning about miracles, was not the worst by far.

(He’d rather give things away to Crowley than to anyone else, which should have tipped him off.)

“I was aboard another ship. Navy. Your friends here _sunk_ it for the cargo and guns. _And_ sunk my books. A Milton first edition... Why are humans so interested in guns and cargo?”

“Royal Navy,” Crowley marveled. He laughed, full-bodied and burning, and Aziraphale found himself hopelessly gravitating towards the sound. “No wonder they’d like to execute you. Guessing the rest of your crew’s joined Davy Jones by now. You really went out sailing with the Royal Navy in the Golden Age of Piracy?”

“Is that what they’re calling it downstairs? This is the best it’s going to get?” Asked Aziraphale, scandalized.

Crowley stood up and stepped away from Aziraphale, into the yellow circle cast by the gas lamp.

“Once Blackbeard showed up, I think so.”

Blasted Blackbeard! Aziraphale never would have lost his books if it weren’t for Blackbeard’s ships!

“I was hardly even kidnapped!” Aziraphale complained, unable to believe that pirates never got any better. Any pirate worth his weight in meat should’ve realistically run him through when he was caught with his books! He considered his execution. These clothes would not do well under saltwater for too long.

“You were kidnapped enough,” Crowley said.

So kidnapped that Crowley had to arrive to help? Find Aziraphale sitting uselessly with his _halo_ of all holy things?

Aziraphale felt like kicking his feet out again. A brief flash of wrath towards Gabriel and the Divine Plan wrestled through his head. Quick as a snake, it was gone and replaced by guilt over having felt anger. 

The demon reached up and itched his cheek. Aziraphale was close enough to hear the scratch of lacquered black nails on stubble. The guilt increased tenfold. 

Fussing with the rope he could touch, Aziraphale glared at the offending facial hair on Crowley’s cheeks. It was a deeper auburn than his curls, short, and crawled down his neck into the billowed collar of his half-open white shirt. Somehow, it was perfectly fashioned, despite his supposed time at sea.

“Oh, are you going to keep that?”

“It makes me look like a pirate,” Crowley insisted, “Something you didn’t even attempt at before trying your way down the Caribbean.”

“If I’d dressed as a pirate, they wouldn’t have let me on the Navy ship, obviously.”

“ _Obviously_ you didn’t have to show up in that horrible red. What were you doing on that thing?”

“Lieutenant Robert Maynard is meant to find Blackbeard sometime soon. I was supposed to be part of a scouting trip as the navigator. Bless them with good wind and a favourable tide.”

“Right, what’d you scout?”

Aziraphale sighed, nodding to his bound wrists at his back. “Pirates.”

“Sort of funny,” Crowley said. "One thing you were supposed to do, and you ran them straight into a pirate ship."

A pirate ship where _Crowley_ happened to be busy slithering. 

Perhaps that was the cause of the otherworldly presence Aziraphale had been feeling. Certainly hadn't pushed him away, had it?

Crowley circled the post Aziraphale was tied to, assessing the situation like he hadn’t come up from behind. Like he hadn’t slithered between Aziraphale’s hands, warm and thick and clever. 

It wasn't a sensation Aziraphale could soon forget. It was important not to give the game away.

Crowley moved as if he failed to remember he wasn’t a limbless serpent anymore, hands gracing his slim hips. Aziraphale turned his head to follow his stride best he could.

“What are you doing here, Crowley? Tempting someone special?”

Crowley went on, voice catching on a high octave and his hands fiddling with his trousers in a complex way, “Always. I’m supposed to be helping Blackbeard escape your lot.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t.” Had Crowley no decency?

“We’ve got to get in touch more often, angel. We needn’t both have come to the colonies.”

First to suggest they come together more often, and then say it’s wasting time to show up in the same place? As if Aziraphale instigated! 

(Well, hadn’t he directed the Navy fleet exactly here?)

Crowley stopped before him. Another snap of his fingers, and an extra gas lamp settled into existence on a tall stack of cargo boxes behind his shoulders. It was a deliberate fire hazard, one that highlighted Crowley’s distinctive silhouette.

Aziraphale wet his bottom lip, tasting cracked salt. Crowley’s glasses held no sign of a fault in his attention, but he shifted his weight, suddenly bothered.

Aziraphale said, “We shouldn’t go against each other. There are better ways for me to spend my time.”

“ _And_ mine. You should’ve let me know about your side wanting Blackbeard caught. These ships are murder on the scales.”

“How long have you been here?” Did Crowley need rescuing as much as Aziraphale?

When Aziraphale thought of the worst case scenario, using a momentarily-forbidden miracle to lend them both a safe escape, Gabriel’s face floated to mind. With a pointed frown on it, dimpling his strong chin. Aziraphale shuddered. At least it hadn’t been a written warning.

Crowley studied Aziraphale’s face with an open interest. “Since May. They captured a boat named after me as it was headed for London. I decided it was better to get a lift from Blackbeard’s fleet himself. Although, no one aboard can really say whether or not I’ve been here all along.”

Crowley wanted to be aboard the _Crowley_. Vain enough for him. Aziraphale had heard that pirates were busy outside the port of Charles Town during the Virginian summer. Never had he expected this wily demon to be a part of the wayward crew. He’d assumed, wrongfully so, that Crowley had more interesting things to do than keep Blackbeard from Heaven’s hands.

“Since _May,_ ” Aziraphale wondered. He focused on the ring of the gaslight behind Crowley’s red hair, frizzy with the humidity below deck. Had Crowley been a serpent this entire time? It must have been very humid and lonely, rocking along with the waves, settled between rotting cargo holds.

Oh, what was he thinking? Crowley probably liked the damp. Hell was like that, wasn’t it? Aziraphale, human-loving as he was, was merely projecting. Crowley seemed to be enjoying Aziraphale’s company well enough, like he’d been starved of contact for months. Pirates likely weren't fantastic conversationalists, although they were magnificent storytellers. 

Seeing Aziraphale look, Crowley smoothed down his hair with a long glide of his hand, pinning it half-back with a flourish. A thin red braid appeared at the crown of his head, framing his ear. 

“Though, I’ve heard that it’s _November_ when my wicked influence really starts.” Crowley nodded down to Aziraphale’s sodden shoes.

“November?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You - you did, you just…” Aziraphale trailed off. Crowley averted his eyes of evening primrose. Aziraphale shook away his bewilderment, wiggling his shoulders for emphasis. “Are you going to take this off of me?”

Not doing so would certainly help Crowley’s side. Keep his earthly adversary locked away. He’d rather Gabriel and Uriel didn’t come to find out he’d been held up by a demon. The last thing he needed was an investigation into his and Crowley’s joined past.

Crowley was better aided by Aziraphale than by holding him captive. It wasn’t the only reason they hung around together, Aziraphale liked to think, but on the surface, that’s where the blame could fall.

“It’s certainly tempting,” said Crowley.

The whole of this place smelled of musty, rotting wood. It was a _miracle_ it hadn’t all fallen apart yet… 

“Isn’t it just?” Aziraphale smiled, lifting his chin and beaming.

Crowley stooped to one knee, coming to rest at Aziraphale’s level. He held up a hand, tipping his head to smirk fondly at Aziraphale from behind the dark shade of his glasses.

Instead of snapping or willing the ropes to fall away, a small, flashy knife materialized between his fingers. He edged to the side and bent, reaching behind for Aziraphale’s wrists with one palm, and held the cutting edge to the abrasive rope in the other.

Warm to the touch, he softly gripped Aziraphale’s bound hands, a lone finger pausing to stroke the bump of Aziraphale’s radius. Aziraphale drew a grounding breath, briefly closing his eyes.

_Move him along_.

“You’ll get filthy,” Aziraphale warned, feeling hot. Crowley’s fingers brushed his lower back, severing the tie between him and the post and evoking a shiver. “There’s this disgusting water everywhere.” He nodded to the slimy floor.

Crowley’s hand flirted with the cuff of Aziraphale’s sleeve. Aziraphale’s breath caught. Crowley slid the knife into the braided ropes, cutting gently and shallow enough to spare Aziraphale from a graze. At last, the oppressive binding came free. It dropped into the wood where Aziraphale sat.

“Oh,” Aziraphale breathed as the tension in his arms eased. God, that was better. He stuck out his feet to where Crowley knelt. “Could you do my ankles, too?”

“ _Your_ hands are free,” Crowley muttered, but cut the binding on Aziraphale’s ankles regardless, avoiding his boots. The knife disappeared, and Crowley stood.

He offered Aziraphale a helping hand.

The angel took it, and Crowley carefully hauled him to his feet. When standing properly, Aziraphale removed his arm for posterity’s sake and winced, for the help had strained his messy wrists. Crowley’s hand hesitated in the air, then dropped to flex uncomfortably at his side. 

"Is that your blood? Are you bleeding?"

"I haven't bled in centuries." Aziraphale smoothed down his rumpled coat.

Crowley snorted. "That's no answer."

Aziraphale brushed off the thighs of his trousers. This incident was going to leave several stains. He grumbled unhappily. When he returned to England, he would get rid of this uniform. Burn it, maybe. Crowley was right - it was a truly horrible red, and a few years behind in circulation for the Royal Navy.

Not that any human had noticed.

“Come on,” Crowley said, nodding to him. “We’ll get you up to a rowboat.”

Aziraphale rubbed his raw wrist where Crowley had touched him, both as a snake and as a person. “We’re _miles_ from any shoreline!”

Crowley fixed him with an odd look. “You’re averse to some minor physical exertion? Come on, humans do it all the time. If you're not bleeding, you can manage it.”

“As I hate to remind you, I’m not quite human.”

“You’ve got a human body, it’s practically the same thing.”

“It’s not. _You’ve_ got a body, does that make _you_ human?”

Crowley appeared wistful for only a moment. It faded quickly from his expression, replaced by a cool drop of the corners of his mouth.

Aziraphale had gone and said the wrong thing. 

Aziraphale sighed. “You make me wonder, Crowley.”

He shrugged past Crowley, the snake that was no snake, heading up the creaking staircase. He eased open the hatched door, almost tasting cool fresh air.

An insistent tug on his jacket hem.

“You don’t worry for them?” Crowley asked. His eyes flicked one way, catching a deep glow cast by the moonlight pouring in from the open door at the top of the stairs. He released Aziraphale, standing on the step below him. It put them at eye level. “The pirates.”

Aziraphale shifted to the side, staring at Crowley with a slack mouth. This was a sudden turn. It took a moment of inner fumbling for him to come up with what to say.

“I worry for everyone.”

It was an angel’s job. Compassion, and so forth. It shouldn’t have included worrying for Crowley, in those moments they couldn’t find one another. But for Aziraphale, it did.

For a long while, he’d hated that. Despised the uneasy crawl beneath his skin when Crowley hadn’t made himself known for decades. It wasn’t only the thought of being alone, without a familiar face or any company for hundreds of years at a time, but the subtle, knocking fear that somewhere, Crowley was being recalled and replaced.

And there was always the looming threat of discovery, hanging like a sword over them both.

“Perhaps you shouldn’t concern yourself with people who won’t get into Heaven. None of them will be there when they’re done here.” Crowley said it with a hiss, his eyes flicking to Aziraphale’s hands.

“Some of them may be. There’s good ones in every rough lot.”

He meant a lot more than the pirates.

Aziraphale turned, striding through the doorway up and onto the deck of the ship.

The night air was warm, pushing the trim of his coat back and bringing the scent of ocean salt. Refreshing and tumbling, a complete turnaround from the stuffy hold beneath deck. Clean and untouched, without a hint of mould or confined space. Aziraphale closed his eyes and breathed it in. The tropical heat below deck flushed from Aziraphale’s mind. 

The whole world caught in a hush. The vessel groaned the same as the Ark had beneath him. Old wood, blessed wood, chosen wood. Choppy waves sloshed into the hull, encouraging the ship along. On the helm, spitting torches lined the rail, attached to masts and the crow's nest high above them, bathing the edges of the deck in subtle orange. 

The riot of loud, bothered animal pairings was here replaced by the gentle sleep of tired sailors, none of whom stirred. Their love of the ship poured out of each floorboard, wound into each braided rope, hung on every barrel and empty bottle. As rough as they’d been, every pirate loved something. 

Crowley stepped out from the bilge behind him, sauntering onto the deck. Together, they walked to the railing, Crowley’s head turning as he sought a rowboat. 

"My, isn't the air fresh?" Aziraphale said. 

"You like cluttered places," dismissed Crowley. The demon raised a hand, plucking his glasses off his face. His dark lashes flitted against his cheek as he looked down to tuck them out of existence. He straightened.

Aziraphale pretended to search for a rowboat, accidentally finding one. Right. Time to get on with the leaving bit. It was for the best. Short and sweet and all that. 

He touched Crowley's arm. "Over there, dear."

"You're in a rush," Crowley said, slouching over to the edge where the small boat hung, suspended by heavy cords and pulleys, and swaying gently with the flow of the ship, tapping the hull gently when they rocked over larger waves. Crowley gave it a dangerous once-over, half a sneer raising the corner of his upper lip. “Looks... very sturdy.”

“Sturdy! Is that all you have to say for it?”

Crowley eyed the thing. Aziraphale swore the loose boards tightened up under that icy glare, splinters flaying back to place. “They don’t make these things with an awful lot of math in mind, angel.” 

Frankly, Aziraphale didn’t know much about this sort of construction. It was as if Crowley read his mind.

Crowley settled one hip against the railing, pouting. His eyes raked to Aziraphale’s boots, and back up to his troubled face. “When was the last time you were on a boat?” 

“With the Navy. Not ten hours ago, Crowley.”

“Before that,” said Crowley, a scowl in his voice. He leaned over the edge, folding his arms and looking down into the black water like he was considering a swim. 

“It must’ve been the Ark,” Aziraphale answered. He paused, tapping his fingers and standing straight beside the demon.

The wind turned against the ship, skimming over the deck. The moonlight poured over the sails and the net-like shrouds, creating the deepest of shadows behind the mainmast.

For a moment, Aziraphale wasn’t on this boat, but on another. 

This scene was centuries old.

Except, at its last iteration, Crowley had faced the tumultuous muddy waters, stared at Aziraphale, and then hidden away until the flood had passed. Aziraphale had long assumed Crowley didn't ever wish to speak of it, of his crystal clear dismay when the time came for the two of them to disguise themselves and slip unnoticed onto the Ark. They'd left the rest of the locals to the will of the Almighty.

There must've been some determination to discuss it, if Crowley had blatantly asked. 

Aziraphale lowered his voice. “Certainly the Ark. With you," he added.

“I can’t believe the flood,” Crowley muttered. The warm wind tore his words away.

“It’s been a long time. All is forgiven.”

“Not by me.” Crowley shook his head.

Nervously, Aziraphale rapped the wood below his touch again. Anyone could be eavesdropping. He could not risk Crowley’s life for the sake of an extra ten minutes of conversation.

“Are you staying, my dear?”

Crowley looked to him, eyes unfocused. Aziraphale had the distinct feeling that Crowley felt very far from familiar ground.

“Have to keep Blackbeard pillaging the seven seas. He’s settled near Plum Point right now. I’m off to tempt him back into piracy. You know. As I do. It’s on the schedule. _Blackbeard, November 1718_.”

Aziraphale looked to the rowboat and back to Crowley, seeming so small and tired of boats and tempting. Damn Gabriel’s schedule. Damn Hell’s. Something in his chest ached, heart beating off-kilter. “Promise me you’ll be careful.”

“I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“Crowley, honestly. England’s trying to purge the West Indies of pirates beginning on September the fifth. You look like one of them, when you’re not busy being a serpent. I don’t want you to go getting discorporated.” It would be utter chaos and it would then take Hell the better half of forever to get Crowley a new body. Aziraphale quite liked the one he inhabited now.

It held familiar muscle memory to raising a champagne glass, nervous ticks round the mouth, smile lines, and eye wrinkles. It was all very human of it. It was a beautiful form, though Aziraphale had never articulated his opinion.

It secretly liked sweet things, could occasionally be caught holding a door open, and rescued stray angels from pirates. 

“You think I’ll get discorporated by a Navy man? You’ve got no faith.”

“Worse,” said Aziraphale, “I think you’ll get discorporated by a pirate.”

Crowley’s mouth knitted into a flat line.

The night air buffeted them both, blowing over the deck. Aziraphale squinted against it. Above, the fore and mainsails whipped their rails in the wind, pushing them onward. They were getting further from the coast with every breeze, further from any land or prying divine eyes.

Aziraphale's feet remained planted on the deck. He tried to think of something to say, something clever or something that Crowley could agree on. Some middle ground, where they both could be happy and blessedly ignorant. _Be safe,_ he wanted to say, _and don’t trust any pirate, or any demon, or any angel_.

“Would you like to come with me, angel?”

Drawing in a shocked breath, Aziraphale turned to Crowley. 

“Nobody would notice an extra pirate on board.” Crowley tipped his head, expression gentling. “Heaven wouldn’t be expecting you here.”

The crew would notice a missing prisoner. They’d all been very excited about his execution planned for the morning. Such devotion couldn’t be subtly miracled from the human mind.

Aziraphale softened. 

“Nobody would notice. Come along.”

“I’d get kidnapped again.”

“Everyone’s getting kidnapped. It’s piracy. Hell doesn’t keep track of all my demonic miracles,” Crowley said quietly, implying he would keep Aziraphale from more incidents in bilges.

There was no way he could do it.

They were meant to keep their interactions brief. No doubt they would be found out if they stayed together for so long. The ship seemed infinitely more dangerous than it had when it threatened Aziraphale’s discorporation, because now it threatened Crowley.

A strange temptation caught Aziraphale by the throat. It fluttered under his skin, like the ebbing tide had caught up with him.

Crowley stared at him, into him, with the salt winds blowing back the red fringe at his temples.

Aziraphale swallowed against his rising desire. Even considering the offer gave him much pause. 

“I… think that I’ll let you have this one.” Aziraphale tested the rope connected to the rowboat for no real reason, then patted his abdomen nervously. He attempted a strained smile, tight as his voice. Couldn’t let on how near he was to disaster. “Can blame it on my not being able to use miracles back at head office. They’d have to loosen up then, wouldn’t they? I wouldn’t go getting into so much trouble.”

“Stay until we’re closer to shore,” said Crowley. His yellow eyes jumped from the boat to Aziraphale and back again.

_Don’t do it, don’t do it, obey, obey, obey._ But, oh, Crowley was temptation personified.

Contemplating the waters, Aziraphale touched his wrist absentmindedly.

Crowley's gaze darted down to it. His brow did something complicated, jaw flexing at the corner.

He extended a hand, palm up, and waited. The wind breezed through his shirt, ruffling the gauzy fabric at his chest, spilling blue starlight over his sharp nose.

Best not. 

That was something, though, wasn’t it? 

Slowly, Aziraphale settled his hand into Crowley's. The demon's long fingers curled around Aziraphale's, and they both hesitated, watching, before anything really happened. There was no harsh tug to haul Aziraphale closer, no snide comments about his nails, no hard grip meeting his skin, no hellfire, no _burn._ Lacking a warning, gentle pressure began to shiver over his knuckles.

It was soft, and it gouged Aziraphale. Not the physicality of it, but the heavy buzz of a miracle being performed, settling deep into his flesh. Snaked around his body like a lurking viper while hesitance hung over his heart. 

At times like this, Aziraphale fantasized over small intimacies. The brush of a shoulder, the touch of two little fingers, the capture of a hand, the twin leaning over the railing of a piracy vessel. These were things he was not meant to covet. 

The sting in his wrist faded, whispering away until healed pink skin was all that remained. Gooseflesh prickled over Aziraphale’s arms, a nonexistent chill raising the hair at the nape of his neck. The dark spot of dried blood on the cuff of his jacket disappeared, replaced by the bright red once more.

Crowley bent at the waist as if checking under the hem to be sure he'd gotten it all. Aziraphale's chest squeezed, losing breath.

"The other one," said Crowley on an exhale, releasing Aziraphale's hand.

Aziraphale suffered through this, drawing it away. It was dangerous to allow these touches. They could not become casual commonplace. He should have rejected the suggestion. "Crowley..."

"The other one," Crowley repeated, less firm, "and then you can leave me." His arm waited patiently in the air between them. 

They were floating out on a sea of holy water. In time, the tide would come in, the reaper to collect, Hell for penance, and Crowley would be destroyed completely.

A rushed touch was everything they got to have. 

Aziraphale clenched his remaining hand into a fist. 

He glanced away from Crowley’s open expression, afraid of the reflection he’d find. When was it that he'd become so content to spend his life hoping he'd run into a demon? When was it that he decided on Crowley and the earth over any promotion?

He gave up. 

They were a matching pair, warm and fitting. Crowley’s opposite hand came up to gently trace Aziraphale’s jacket hem. The lightest touch of his fingertips to Aziraphale’s inner wrist forced a heavy weight into Aziraphale’s throat.

When was it, exactly, that Aziraphale had begun to allow himself to be held so tenderly? When was it that Crowley began the holding?

"I don't think highly of them for this," said Crowley, husky above the lapse of the night. “None of the lot should go Above for this."

"They’ve done worse. Didn’t you point that out?” He imagined pirates in Heaven. Blank and white and oceanless. That was punishment enough. 

Crowley’s fingers stuttered their path along Aziraphale’s wrist. He rubbed exactly where Aziraphale still felt the ghost of a serpent winding between his hands. Fluttering shivers followed Crowley’s touch, pulsing roughly at his veins, as if something inside Aziraphale was battling desperately to emerge.

“No.”

“One of us did, I’m sure.”

“They should all end up Below.” 

Aziraphale’s lip twitched, strangely touched. Here Crowley stood, condemning a group of sailors because they’d chafed Aziraphale’s wrists.

He offered a reassuring smile. “Above isn’t all that. I’m sure they won’t have a remarkable time in either place.”

Crowley’s eyebrows raised. “Never heard you doubt so obviously before.”

“Not doubting,” Aziraphale corrected. It was silent, and dark, and so it was alright. “Just explaining.”

“I was there, once,” Crowley said, and nothing more. His focus remained on Aziraphale’s veins.

Silly of him to entertain. They were what they were, and nothing more. 

Crowley was his adversary and his reason for being - the two things were separate where they should’ve been intertwined. Crowley urged him quietly, a voice in his ear, to disobey, to pilfer just a little, to shirk duty ever so slightly. Aziraphale was always in suspense for the next temptation. It was never enough. 

Crowley released him, hovering within arm’s reach. His painted fingers returned to the cool railing. Below, the churning black waves caught the glint of moonlight and cast his face in blue. His eyes weren't demonic gold in this light, but instead found a new shaded hue to settle on.

They were forest green, like Irish moss and like heather, like the earth he so adored.

Aziraphale flexed a hand, trying the strength of his fingers. Rowing dozens of miles back to shore in the middle of the night was extremely unappealing. Crowley had done a remarkable job. Aziraphale himself might not have even been so thorough, might’ve left the pink of a scar or missed a stain. Crowley was like that, wasn’t he? 

Crowley put on a faux smile, rueful lines appearing by the corners of his nose. Tension eased - not like it had gone away, but like it had been converted into resigned sadness. The ocean sloshed tirelessly into the ship, spraying foam over the hull far beneath them, miraculously leaving the two of them dry.

“Thought I’d smelled blood, but I didn’t realize it was yours. I would’ve let you go, straightaway.”

“I should thank you for releasing me at all,” Aziraphale said, as if this day could’ve ended up another way. “Humans are getting very good at knots. It’s alright.”

“It isn’t. I should’ve looked past wanting to tease you.”

Strange. Crowley never said anything like that. Crowley teased and poked and prodded. There were plenty of humans who Crowley had indirectly cast into madness and sin. With Aziraphale he was unapologetic because he simply never passed that point of upset. Crowley took care not to. 

Aziraphale's brows twitched. Crowley cared. 

He cared enough to not snap his fingers and heal Aziraphale abruptly. Enough not to simply wave and free him by willpower from the rope below deck. Or - perhaps that wasn’t Crowley caring. Perhaps that was a desire of his. 

Additionally, Crowley cared about his image. He held quite a big heart, one that he fancied to pretend didn’t exist. For a long time, for the sake of his own, Aziraphale had gone along with this.

The demon forced an unhappy expression and directed it at Aziraphale. 

"Don't go getting any ideas,” he said, trying too much to harden his voice. Aziraphale heard the tremble rise, heard Crowley’s terror of being found out. “I had to get you, or they might've sent someone new to face me, and that's just inconvenient. I already know you, and it'd be a hell of a lot of work to figure someone else out. Not to mention the Arrangement! Try setting _that_ up with another demon, the trouble goes double for an angel!”

Aziraphale gentled, leaning to the rail Crowley had set his weight on. His eyes crinkled, cheek rising with a smile. "You do know me."

If he thought about it, Crowley was the only one.

Wary, Crowley stilled. Aziraphale saw an indent in his lip where Crowley was biting his tongue. His nails tapped tirelessly on the salt-slick wood. “You sound like you're getting ideas."

"Didn't you?”

“Yes, but I’m allowed,” snapped Crowley.

Crowley always painted such a picture of a demon’s freedom. Maybe he wanted Aziraphale to be envious, yet Aziraphale had never seen real proof of any more liberty than Heaven permitted. As much as he could tell, even Crowley wasn’t allowed ideas. 

“Isn't that why this whole thing's come about? You ending up on the wrong side, because you had ideas?”

Crowley struggled to say, "Hell isn't the wrong side. It's the right side."

Aziraphale would've struggled just as much to claim Heaven was the right side. He wasn’t even sure if that was what he meant when he thought about _the right side_. 

Where was this wavering doubt coming from? There had been no warning - no way to refuse it. It wasn't there, until it was. Crowley did that to him. 

Crowley’s lip curled. “But it all happened because I had ideas."

His eyes shifted to observe Aziraphale at his right. They were still green where there should have been yellow, but the irises now eclipsed the white, yearning for honesty. 

Immense stress was bleeding through Crowley’s sunken posture, the expansion of his eyes, the distortion of his reality. 

Aziraphale had rushed things. He wrung his hands over the sleeves of his jacket, looking away. " _Don't_ get any more ideas, Crowley. You don't want to end up like this."

“Like this?” Crowley croaked, astonished. “I’m the one who ended up like, like— like anything! You’re the same as you’ve always been.”

“I meant, I meant. Oh, you know what I meant.”

“I don’t. I hardly ever know what you mean.” 

“I _mean_ ,” Aziraphale stressed, “you don’t want to end up a busybody for Heaven. Don’t get ideas about the Ark. Don’t start to think that Heaven must be forgiven by you to proceed anywhere. Heaven will persevere, any way.” 

Crowley spat over the edge at the mention of Above.

“Heaven doesn’t give a toss for me. Or for you. Doesn’t give a toss for anyone. And besides, it isn’t Heaven I don’t forgive - I don’t forgive the Almighty.”

Panic surged in Aziraphale. He glanced over his shoulder, heat flushing his collar. “Crowley!”

“She doesn’t care about Her creations.”

“She must!” 

Crowley twisted to face Aziraphale, pained.

“What was the point, Aziraphale? Really? If you think about it, even for longer than a second, doesn’t it sound strange? Pointless? Killing all those people, all those kids. Just to start over, when they could’ve been so easily moved. Miracled away, suddenly asked to relocate, tempted to South Asia— anything. Anything, besides that. But no. And what were their deaths for? What did I Fall for?” 

Aziraphale lacked any intelligent response.

Crowley was still thinking of the Ark.

Still getting ideas, still asking questions, still tempted into disobedience, after all this time. It wasn’t a lesson he failed at - being punished - but rather one he chose not to internalize. 

“The world’s going to end someday, and all the humans will be gone. Devil, so will we! You! She was supposed to love them. If She did that, what else will She do?” Crowley’s sharp profile turned back to meet the black ocean. Following his rant, he fell quiet. “There isn’t a point to half of this.”

“There is a point.” There couldn’t _not_ be one. There were infinite divine reasons. They were out of reach, beyond logical comprehension, that was all. “Only, we aren’t meant to understand it.”

Crowley didn’t want to hear it. He was weary. “Stop arguing,” he pleaded.

“You’re not—”

“Just _tell_ me!” Crowley shouted at Aziraphale, whipping to face him. His voice snapped higher frightfully, mouth in a snarl. “Tell me _you_ don’t understand it. Just tell me you don’t understand it. Say that you don’t understand it.”

Crowley was asking, _tell me we are the same. Tell me we are made of the same things; tell me that we feel the same. Tell me that we are in this together_. 

Tell me that I am not alone. That I am not the only one.

Sometimes, the lone clear part of the Plan was Crowley. And even then, the going was murky.

Every angel seemed to perfectly understand the Plan and its divine point. Aziraphale lacked any solid conviction. 

Tonight, the air rang clear, the wind warmly fell into a lull, the ship rolled over easy open water, and Aziraphale had never understood his purpose less. 

“I don’t understand it,” said Aziraphale.

Crowley’s shoulders slumped, puppet strings cut. The assurance slipped over his form, evening out the line of his back, relaxing his stiff knees.

His figure trembled in the shade of the night, stuttering sighs and pushing out long, calming breaths. Shakily and without scanning for rejection, Crowley slid a hand across the rail towards Aziraphale, his fingers twitching hopelessly. 

This time, Aziraphale met it on its way, greeting it on the old wood. They should have had this moment on the Ark, when Crowley truly needed it. He pushed his fingers between Crowley’s, holding tight to the backs of his knuckles. His skin was nothing like his snake scales. It was dry and capable, and in need of subtle protection and affection.

They shouldn’t be doing this. 

Crowley was the one in need of rescue, not Aziraphale.

No, Aziraphale did not understand the Plan or any mysterious movements of the Almighty. It was enough to understand Crowley. 

The angel settled a comforting hand on Crowley’s back. He rubbed, the cloth of Crowley’s shirt whispering under his touch, his tight muscles easing. Crowley slouched more heavily over the railing. Aziraphale briefly worried. Would Crowley tip himself over the edge of the boat?

Aziraphale murmured while Crowley shook, holding his other hand frightfully tight, “I know the Ark may never make sense. I don’t understand it myself.” And Crowley made good points. He always did. Perk of being a demon - practical debate skills. “But it is something that happened. There is no retracting it. We can only see to it that it never happens again.”

Crowley’s body slumped deeper, back curved and elbows pressing to the rail for balance. His free hand covered his eyes, his face turned away.

“Lord, this is stupid.” His voice came out muffled and grievously unhappy. Aziraphale loved his voice. He hated it like this. “It _will_ happen again. She’ll do it again. All these revolutions coming, things will happen again.”

“Revolutions?” Asked Aziraphale. He pressed his hand further up, sliding it over the back of Crowley’s neck, smoothing his red curls away. The fine hair filtered between his fingers, soft and salted. He had never felt this before, but had gazed longingly at the fanciful up-dos often enough that Crowley really should’ve gotten the message. Crowley shuddered. Aziraphale tried to smile and lighten Crowley’s somber mood. “Crowley, are you giving away Hell’s secrets?”

Crowley took this immensely seriously, head tilting to the side as Aziraphale’s wandering touch ventured to the base of his scalp. “I’d give away any secrets. Aziraphale, I’d give away any secrets to keep it from happening again, and I shouldn’t be so ready to do that. Go ahead. Ask anything.”

An opportunity to ask anything. Heaven’s agenda, however, did not grace Aziraphale’s thoughts. He had his own. 

He hesitated.

“Why? Why, against everything,” Aziraphale’s throat clogged, words going raspy. He cleared it while he caressed the nape of Crowley’s neck, deciding he hated the sea, “are you so... good?”

“I’m not good,” Crowley stated. Aziraphale waited. “I don’t know. I’m not meant to be. We both know I’m not.”

Crowley at last pulled his hand from his face, dragging it past his chin and looking at his counterpart from over the red rims of his waterline. Crowley was silent, wet mouth dropped open slightly. His grip was the only fierce thing about him. 

Aziraphale smirked, a bastard. “Well. I’ve always harbored some doubt of you.”

“Doubt of me?” Crowley managed. He sounded agonized, two breaths from a sob. 

“Doubt in your badness.”

A step closer may have broken his friend. May have been too forward. Aziraphale did it anyways, the toe of his regulation shoes tapping into Crowley’s boots. The notches of Crowley’s spine shifted under Aziraphale’s less-than-friendly hand as the demon straightened slightly.

“Oh.” Crowley’s eyebrows furrowed, a betrayed crinkle forming over the bridge of his nose. “ _Oh_ ,” he said again, this time faking anger. The effect was lessened considerably, because a windswept curl escaped from his tie (loosened, due to Aziraphale’s stroking) and dangled over his eye. “I am bad.”

“Sometimes. Other times, you rescue your enemy and heal him when it is in your best interest to allow him to die.”

“Not really die, though,” said Crowley. His sad eyes added, _right_? 

“Right,” said Aziraphale. His stomach turned as troubled as the oceans. His hand traveled lower, pushing into the blade of Crowley's shoulder. “You are _good_ , Crowley.”

Crowley flushed up with color and quit slouching. He stood to his full height, suddenly electrified, forcing Aziraphale to retract from Crowley’s back. His eyes were wide and bright with surprise, reminiscent of his expression upon the garden wall. It was like Crowley had come into bloom - a sundown lily.

Aziraphale took to it at once.

Pulling his hand from Crowley’s, he reached to adjust the ruffles of Crowley’s white buttoned shirt. Crowley stiffened and let him, unsure of himself. The gauzy ruffles were blown askew again by the wind immediately. Aziraphale flattened them, gently pressing his palms to Crowley’s chest. 

A fluttering thunder greeted him, pounding out from under the bumps of Crowley’s ribs. Aziraphale’s thumb rubbed Crowley’s sternum. He’d never felt such a great relief at confirming what he already knew was there. His voice dropped low. “You’re kind. However much you pretend that you aren’t.”

“God,” Crowley said, reeling, “you’re revolting. You and your...” Crowley made a confusing sound, like he couldn’t decide which language to use, let alone the words, “your bloody halo.”

Aziraphale touched the top of his head, where ruined white curls were and the halo definitely wasn’t. “You don’t like it.”

“I do like it. It’s just, odd, seeing it.” Crowley’s lips thinned, and he narrowed his eyes. “You don’t see an awful lot downstairs. Maybe I’d forgotten about them.”

Crowley had not forgotten about them. Rather, he missed them.

Awkwardly, Crowley tilted his body nearer. He seemed to bend at the wrong angles, take up too much leg room, and invade Aziraphale’s space with those slim thighs in high black trousers. Leaning on the rail with a jutted hip, Crowley’s hands twitched for lack of a task, and he crossed his arms.

“It’s, a, um,” Crowley tried. “It’s a beautiful halo, wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Was it him, or did the sense of love on board grow stronger? Perhaps the wind had carried something from very far away. 

“You don’t even like the world.” Aziraphale tucked his chin, wondering at his friend.

“I _do_ like it!” 

Crowley's face was mesmerizing, sharp in angle and soft in expression. He was absolutely a demon on the outside (Aziraphale had spent enough time staring to be certain), but his wondrous inside was bleeding through. With each clandestine meeting, more goodness spilled out, and Crowley was always desperate to clean up the mess. 

Tonight was no different. 

“I do like the world,” Crowley repeated. “More than you give me credit for. I find it interesting.”

“What do you like about it?”

Crowley blew a puff of air out of his cheek, eyes turning up, searching the starry sky for an answer. They dipped to regard Aziraphale’s lips. “Well, there’s the pirates, for starters. And the... And the, er, endless... water.” 

Aziraphale beamed, delighted. “You’re pulling things from a hat.”

“And,” said Crowley, “there’s my present company.”

Oh, Crowley. Aziraphale's smile became anxious again. He toddled in place, averting his attention. Why must Crowley be so devastating? "Best not to admit things like that." 

Crowley loomed closer, wanting his confession. "Don't you enjoy it?"

Enjoyment was for humans and earthly pleasures. Crowley could not be something Aziraphale _enjoyed._

"This. Us, the Arrangement," Crowley clarified.

The lunches, the dinners, the meetings, the witty conversation. Shadowed corners in Middle Eastern street markets, high gardens swinging in Babylon, circles of chipped stone pillars in Rome. Secret spots and confidential letters, private rooms and hidden cities. The shared time spent together under the guise of duty and divesting each other of it. Everyone Above and Below seemingly forgot that there was a middle, that not everything on earth was comprised of polar opposites. As much as any angel could, Aziraphale adored it. But he wasn't meant to. 

It was less about the Arrangement, and more about Crowley. 

"The Arrangement is out of necessity."

"It's not really, though, is it? It's something we chose to do. And we're not supposed to _choose_ to do anything. Mindless obedience, that's what everyone Upstairs wants."

Aziraphale thought of Crowley's inability to ask questions and get ideas, and how he was doing both right now. "Crowley."

Crowley snaked closer. His chin dipped, eyes alight and locked onto Aziraphale's, their chests nearly together. If Aziraphale breathed any harder, they might swell enough to touch. 

"You don't understand it," assured the demon, "but I don't think you try very hard to."

"That's-- that's--" Aziraphale fumbled for an answer. Crowley's body - so tangible - connected to Aziraphale's. His arms uncrossed, one holding the rail at their side, the other tentatively brushing Aziraphale's red coat. Crowley needed something steady and for him, Aziraphale was the single option. The wind stirred the ocean, waves cresting into the ship, creating the ambient sounds of seawater and sparking thoughts of drowning; white noise behind their words. 

It wasn't dirty by human standards, but this was the filthiest thing Aziraphale had ever done. Body to body, like a pair of people. Crowley’s thigh pressed into Aziraphale’s hip, their abdomens touching all the way down.

A zing of interest shot up Aziraphale’s spine, forcing his skepticism down and away to some undecided netherworld. By all measures, he should have resorted to physically shoving Crowley, swearing him off, performing a miracle for distance. But he was pinned by Crowley's touch, and escape was suddenly impossible. There was no divine influence required. All capabilities left him.

Earth was soft, and humans never minded, and wasn't this so much easier? By God, it took all of Aziraphale's strength to reject an offer of companionship and intimacy through touch. There was nothing else like Crowley in the world. It was blinding; it was awful. 

"Crowley," said Aziraphale again. It was a sigh. His skin sung; his heart thundered in his ears. 

Crowley's hand slipped up from Aziraphale's coat, transversing the stiff line of his arm, following up the bend of his elbow to his shoulder. He squeezed there, at the junction to Aziraphale's neck, as if checking that Aziraphale was real. 

His hand turned up, little finger finding the line of Aziraphale's jaw and thumb catching at Aziraphale's cheek, the pad of it following the lines beneath his eye. His fingers gently traced the hairline behind Aziraphale's left ear. 

The dark made it hard to keep Crowley's subdued stare. Aziraphale's mouth dropped open, trying not to blink. If this was everything he got to have, then he was going to commit it to memory. Crowley's wind-blown red hair, the tangled braid dropping to cover the curl of his tattoo. Half-lidded golden eyes, slitted pupils blown wide to capture the starlight; the slack mouth.

The adoration poured from him as clearly as it poured from the ship they stood upon. 

Stray emotion careened from Aziraphale's blotted mind. Pleasure and guilt, and hovering above everything - hope. Fear, for what was to happen and what was to come after it. _Come with me, angel. Heaven wouldn't be expecting you here_. Fields of wildflowers and poppies, human villages with established locals and freshwater springs, oceans of salt and pirate ships. Anywhere Crowley was, Aziraphale longed to follow. It was not difficult to tilt his face up to meet Crowley's, by the same principle.

Crowley was strikingly warm - it was like kissing an ember. Burning deeply from the inside out, the kind of heat that killed you.

He wouldn't have expected a demon to kiss so gently.

Truthfully, the touch was hardly there. It was a brush of two pairs of lips, supple and wary. Not halfhearted but unsure - with many years of unmet expectations packed behind it. Crowley breathed the heat into Aziraphale’s mouth, like Hellfire and salvation all at once.

It wasn't that Aziraphale was strictly out of practice at this very human activity, it was that he suffered from general misconceptions about demons as beings. Not all of them were suave, sophisticated, experienced, and well-spoken - when Crowley was being kissed, in fact, he was less than none of these things.

Ergo, Crowley needed to be shown around a little.

Aziraphale fell back on his toes, his lower back hitting the rail behind him, and Crowley followed, his lips pressing to the corner of Aziraphale's mouth in a wild effort to keep their connection. As Aziraphale's hands finally flew to find Crowley's cheeks, Crowley whimpered. His face was soft and hot, rough with stubble around the jaw, not at all as sleek as Crowley made it appear. Crowley dropped his hold to grip Aziraphale's shoulder, twisting the fabric of Aziraphale's collar, mashing it to Aziraphale's throat. 

Oh, he couldn't care about his own trepidation. Aziraphale hooked his arm around Crowley's neck, drawing him intensely close, drinking in the scent of him, hair so near and skin tinged with southern sweat and bilge wood.

Lashes fluttered against Aziraphale's cheek, the line of Crowley's nose pressing into his. Seasalt and vinegar and spiced Indian teas - human, human, human.

Crowley's hands fidgeted at Aziraphale's shoulder and hip, nails finding a place to claw at by Aziraphale's coat. Aziraphale skimmed an expert tongue along Crowley’s upper lip. 

Crowley moaned.

Heady weight pushed into Aziraphale’s groin as he was crowded further into the railing. 

_That_ was definitely new.

Crowley jerked back, face rosey. Incredibly endearing, the defining picture of someone who had just been thoroughly kissed. He opened his wet mouth to say something, breath hot on Aziraphale's chin, but his voice didn't come out right. He tried again, coming out rough, "Sorry. That's... new."

"That's just what I was thinking."

"Is it bad?"

"No," Aziraphale said. "It's absolutely necessary for this next part, actually."

He hungrily watched Crowley's throat bob. "Next part?"

Aziraphale dropped his hand, pulling apart the ruffles of Crowley's shirt. Rewarded with a strip of Crowley’s chest, slim and well-kept like the rest of him, Aziraphale reeled. His mind swam with punishments and threats from Heaven. In the night, when they were both meant to be on assignment very far from each other, who would be looking for them? Gabriel hated sailing.

If Aziraphale stood still too long, he would lose any nerve he had.

One arm still locked behind Crowley’s neck, keeping him close, Aziraphale reached to run a careful touch down Crowley’s skin, between shadowed pectorals and down to his navel. Crowley twitched, baring his teeth. "I'd thought you were good at tempting."

Crowley panicked, body in a dilemma. "Usually, I'm not on the other end of it. Just general tempting, I'm not the temptation."

"You tempt me all the time."

"To lunch," managed Crowley. Aziraphale’s hands dropped to Crowley’s hips, tucking his thumbs into the waistband and discovering burning skin. "This is a tad different."

This temptation was more than Aziraphale could resist. It was only a spot of indulgence, not unlike the rest of his pleasures on earth. He should've known right from wrong. He was starting to think he wasn't very good at resisting things.

Aziraphale tugged until Crowley leaned forwards again, one knee slipping between Aziraphale's legs, his lips returning to greet Aziraphale's. Aziraphale tilted his head, finding the going smoother this time around. Crowley's lips were pliable and curved into a breathless smile, parting when Aziraphale's urged them to. 

The hard length in Crowley's trousers rocked into Aziraphale's, pinging decadent shocks down Aziraphale's spine, arousal curling tight. He broke away, gasping, far too confined in this uniform. For a blissful half-second, Aziraphale was certain the ship had gone over a large wave, but Crowley rocked nearer twice more, hips canting low into Aziraphale's, and the notion of the contact being accidental disappeared. Crowley's figure shook hard, a sweat breaking out under Aziraphale's hands, which wandered up the line of his ribs, tracing edge bump, as Crowley set his face into Aziraphale's neck.

Crowley jolted again, mouth hot and open and breathing hard into Aziraphale's skin. The unending rhythm at his erection pierced Aziraphale at his core, his eyes drifting shut. Dear God, did humans feel like this _all_ the time? Aziraphale wrested a hand from between their bodies to steady himself at the railing behind him, briefly risking a cheeky palm to Crowley's cock over his clothing.

"Steady there," he said, voice wavering. 

Crowley made a confusing high sound in the back of his throat, grinding out the words as he ground into Aziraphale. " _Don't_ tell me to be steady." 

Had he any more air in his lungs, Aziraphale might've laughed. 

The friction was delightful. Better than anything Aziraphale had ever felt. It was unbelievable, what they were doing and where they were doing it, but the illicitness of it made Aziraphale's entire being feel blistering, _sweltering_ in the summer ocean heat. Every thought diverted to Crowley, every delicious push, every exquisite shiver that washed over them both. Aziraphale stroked a hand down Crowley's abdomen again, clutching his bare waist through the open drapes of his shirt.

They were both clothed and no trousers had been undone and already Aziraphale felt himself dangling precariously over a precipice, as well as the literal edge of the ship. Slick wood pressed into the back of his coat, his boots tangled with stray ropes from their frantic movements. His hair curled with humidity, mussed with perspiration smeared there by Crowley's insistent face. Definitely one of the _least_ decent things he'd done.

"Oh, angel," cried Crowley, possessing Aziraphale in a firm grip round the shoulders, "angel _, angel,_ angel."

At last unable to keep his wits, Aziraphale tightened, hauling Crowley to him. He lathered the demon with attention, finding the notches of his spine and drawing up the musculature to the base of where his wings would be, tugging the curls at the nape of his neck, making the tie fall away entirely. On the next thrust, Crowley's cock slid a hot, hard line against Aziraphale's - dare he say it, slow and measured.

The night breeze was doing nothing to cool him down. 

Aziraphale's head dropped back, holding Crowley hard as shudders wracked through his arms. Every nerve was a needle driving into him, every star in the sky was a blur. Crowley kissed his throat through it, slouching to taste his clavicle, peeling back the suffocating coat collar. 

"There's no one like you in the world," Aziraphale murmured, sucking in a desperate breath, his eyes biting. God, this stung him deep. The world was flaming like mad, and Crowley was the star at the center of it, thrusting to meet Aziraphale. Crowley nudged against him, stuttering, growing erratic. Aziraphale sighed, overly sensitive. "You're brilliant, you're amazing, dear _Lord,_ you're brighter than any halo..."

Crowley cheeks grew impossibly hotter in the crook of Aziraphale's shoulder, and he reared back to watch Aziraphale. He'd gone a rather alarming shade of red, the dark flush mottling all the way down his clavicles and spilling across his upper chest like a blossomed rose. 

Aziraphale secreted a hand down the front of Crowley's trousers, squeezing firmly. 

He said, “Lovely.”

"Oh," said Crowley brokenly, and came.

His shoulders went rigid, his cock spurting a white tide over Aziraphale's fingers, everything wet and hot and smooth. His fingers fisted into Aziraphale's coat for dear life as he moaned. Aziraphale feared Crowley would spontaneously discorporate from the violence of it. 

Crowley held Aziraphale for a long beat, and even when he relinquished his tremendously tight grip, he hovered in the same spot. Aziraphale drew his sinful hand from Crowley’s clothes, fussing with the white ruffles. 

Perhaps he could leave the shirt open for the time being. Crowley’s chest was heaving so sinfully hard in the shadow of night, it was a wonder to stare at. He retracted his knee from between Aziraphale's, standing to his full height. Aziraphale shifted, his own thighs sticky. Oh, did that really happen?

He may have been in a dream. 

“Could you, um. Spare a miracle?” 

Crowley stared at him, unblinking. 

“Crowley?”

Crowley swept into him, cupping his jaw and pressing their lips together. Powerless against it, Aziraphale swooned, thoughts swimming. 

"Oh, angel, don't row off," said Crowley to his cheek. "You don't need to leave. I'll miracle your execution away."

Aziraphale stopped. Crowley's yellow eyes shone despite thin cloud cover obscuring the moonlight, otherworldly. Heaven would surely think something amiss if he didn’t succeed with Blackbeard. They could not find out he’d lost his sword.

"I'll be here," he settled, "come Hell or high water."

Crowley snorted, sounding stuffy. "That really is such a poor joke."

Settling his long, thin arms over Aziraphale’s shoulders, Crowley leaned in to his face, pushing his nose to Aziraphale’s ear like a loose embrace. Relaxation eased into Aziraphale's body, flattening tensed muscles and stifling stress. Physically drained, emotionally released, slack and tired. 

"Crowley," asked Aziraphale, attempting to think past the breath tickling his cheek, “what about the pirates?"

Crowley pulled back to look at Aziraphale, dazed in the head, forgetting entirely about the crew. Aziraphale smiled despite it. “What about them?"

"Well, it will be morning soon, and I'm meant to... _walk the plank_ , as it were."

It was nice to think, for now, that the pirates were the thing to worry about.

"Don't worry about them. They'll sleep until we reach England."

Aziraphale saw the comment for what it was. Crowley, conceding. "Would you?"

"There's enough pirates on the sea. Blackbeard's time is coming to an end, same as the sailing age." Crowley’s eyes shone in starlight. The great blue nebulae he had spent lifetimes stringing along the southern sky peered back at him, as fantastical as Crowley himself. “I said you could ask anything. This is nothing in comparison.”

“You could get into trouble,” Aziraphale said. He tensed, seizing handfuls of Crowley’s shirt. “We - we’re _both_ going to get into trouble—”

“We won’t! Not now, anyways, middle of the ocean, angel, who’s around? Not Michael or Ligur or Hastur or anyone!”

“Oh, Crowley, say that again.”

Crowley’s brows tilted up, sad lines appearing at his forehead. He swallowed visibly, pulling back. “I can’t promise anything.” 

“Say it anyways.” 

“We won’t get into trouble.” Crowley’s lip twitched. “You’ll deliver an entire ship full of pirates to England and they’ll all be tried, and you’ll probably get a commendation or some riff-raff.”

“Or they’ll be pardoned,” Aziraphale said. “If they surrender before the fifth then they all receive pardons. Start a new lease on life.”

Crowley thought for a moment. 

“They kidnapped you and bled you, and you’re going to let them get pardoned?”

“Crowley, I invented the pardon.”

“That’s wicked,” said Crowley. His fingers nervously danced near Aziraphale’s elbow. Aziraphale leaned into him, allowing Crowley’s hand to connect. Crowley blew out a hot, anxious breath. Like the breeze around them, it dripped with tropical heat. “That’s wicked of you. Preventing proper justice.”

“It is justice. Helping all parties involved.”

Crowley sighed, running a finger down the line of Aziraphale’s golden buttons. For a heartbeat, he faced the open expanse of black water, as if gauging their time and distance from Europe. The sails clanged against their masts. The wind sighed over the helm. He smirked, hooking a sly finger around one Aziraphale's buttons, looking back. 

He whispered as he leaned in close again, “They’re pirates, angel. It isn’t exactly a great benevolence.”

**Author's Note:**

> crowley rescues aziraphale yet again, because i figure it's just in Aziraphale's nature to 1) get into these situations and 2) manufacture them often enough as an excuse to get crowley to show up. gently canon divergent w their meetings pre Armageddon, and maybe a little historically inaccurate bc i got my pirate information from wikipedia!  
> I heard there was a lack of explicitness for these two so naturally I had to come bearing boat sex. i also did NOT intend for this to be like 13k but the banter just didn't stop...  
> leave a comment!  
> p.s. can u count the number of intricate rituals? <3


End file.
